Where the wild things came from

Maurice Sendak’s children’s book, Where the Wild Things Are, published in 1963, has become very successful throughout the years and was released as a movie last Friday.
The book’s main character is a boy named Max who gets into trouble with his mother and is sent to bed without any supper. Before long, Max’s room magically becomes a forest, and he sails away to a land where monsters live. Max isn’t scared, though, and becomes king of the wild things, but after a while, he begins feeling homesick. Max sails back home and his supper is still hot when he arrives in his bedroom.
Many teachers and professors like this story and use it to help children develop creativity and imagination.
“I honestly think it was such a success because everyone can use their own creativity to kind of imagine and figure out what’s going on,” said Emilie Davis, an elementary special education teacher. “I always liked the ending where he comes back from this other world that he’s imagined and his dinner is still hot.”
Melina Alexander, an education professor at Weber State University, said she likes how the book contains a couple pages that have only pictures on them.
“It’s important on the picture pages to have children add their own story to the book,” Alexander said. “Adding in the reading portion to go along with the pictures helps add in some extra imagination with the reading,” Alexander said.
The book does contain a couple larger words, like rumpus and gnashed that may be confusing for children to understand, but those words help better a child’s reading skills. Davis said the book is an overall easy read, and the bigger words help challenge the children. Alexander agreed that children need to be exposed to a variety of vocabulary and learn what the new words mean.
Not only does the book help develop imagination, it also helps children’s developmental growth.
Alexander said the book is well written which helps kids get involved in the story.
“The book also talks about what all children go through like I was naughty but my mommy still loves me,” Alexander said.
Another developmental asset in the book is how it encourages children to face their fears.
“I think it’s really good to show that Max is friends with the monsters,” Alexander said. “Kids can find out monsters aren’t always the thing under the bed that’s going to scare them. I think this is good because it shows that yes you can go to scary places but still have a positive experience.”
The storyline and artwork also contributed to the book’s success. The artwork won the Caldecott Medal, which is an award for the most distinguished picture book of the year.
“I would say the book’s success comes from a combination of the story itself and the artwork,” Alexander said. “The artwork is phenomenal so you can really get a sense of what happened like when he sailed in and out in a day.”
Since the book has been successful throughout the years, a movie was recently made and many people are excited to see it.
Alexander said she thinks the movie will be wonderful but it might be a little scary for younger children.
“You don’t want bad dreams over a book that’s fabulous,” Alexander said. “The thing that’s good about books is you can make them in your mind as scary or as calm as you want. Your own imagination takes you to where you want to go but when little kids see a movie they can’t do that holdback.”
When Davis heard the book was being made into a movie, she was curious about how such a short book could turn into an hour and a half movie.
“I haven’t seen the movie, but I’m interested in what it is,” Davis said. “I think maybe what they did was just take that imagination and creativity of the book and then just sort of went wild with it.”
Students on campus are also talking about the book becoming a movie.
“I did read the book as a kid,” said WSU freshman, Dustin Farnsworth. “I always liked when Max and all the monsters partied together. I don’t really understand how they’ll make like a 10-page book into a movie, though.”
Farnsworth said the book has probably been so successful because people like the concept of how Max goes to another world and acts like his mom, bossing around the monsters.
The book, Where the Wild Things Are, has been read for the past 46 years, and in the words of Alexander, “Go Max!”